


Seven Tears Into the Sea

by ThatAloneOne



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, Fluff and Angst, Podfic Available, Selkie AU, and selkies are immortal!, but tbh mostly fluff, with Carmilla still a vampire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-10
Updated: 2018-02-10
Packaged: 2019-03-16 04:59:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13629102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatAloneOne/pseuds/ThatAloneOne
Summary: Seven tears in the sea for my love to come home, to come home to me.Carmilla meets a selkie, again and again. It's easy for her to fall in love when she feels anchored.





	Seven Tears Into the Sea

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Melime](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melime/gifts).



> I've always had a weakness for selkie stories. Clearly we need more of those in this fandom. If you prefer to see Carmilla as a selkie, I have an au for that too!
> 
> Mention of considered suicide at the beginning (Carmilla thinks about drowning herself) but it doesn't happen.

_Seven tears-_

 

* * *

 

Carmilla was an odd kind of naive as a girl. Well. Not a girl. A young creature. A girl-shaped thing that should have become a woman but never would. 

Carmilla was naive in how she thought she and her mother were the only inhuman things in the world. Like she was the only thing with teeth and burning eyes. 

It was less than a century off from Carmilla’s eighteenth birthday when she first met the selkie. Carmilla balanced on a pier and considered drowning herself, the familiar smell of the sea filling her with salt and rot. She didn’t know if drowning would take, but if anything could drag her down, it would be this wild and hungry ocean. 

She might have done it, too, when she heard the slapping from behind her. No, not slapping. It was more indelicate than that. It sounded like someone had caught a whale and heaved it onto the dock. And then again. And then again. The only problem with that is that it was winter. Anything with sense had left this frigid place for warmer waters. 

Carmilla turned. Against the planks and the sea spray lay a girl. She _poured_  water, her hair a dark mass, her skin sleek. Wrapped around her modesty was a skin, well tanned and still furred. 

It was the first time Carmilla had been rendered speechless in a decade. 

“Bonjour!” the girl announced. She attempted to sit but something failed out and she ended rolling, producing the same slapping sound that had startled Carmilla earlier. “Salut!”

Carmilla took a breath. The salt tasted like bitterness. Of all the days to be disturbed from her thoughts… “We aren’t in France.” A beat. “In case you hadn’t noticed.”

The girl frowned. “Huh. England?” She squinted. “Germany? Austria? You don’t sound like English is your native language.”

Carmilla’s slight frown turned down farther. She didn’t like being reminded of her failure to eradicate her accent. Maman had taken her to task for it on more than one occasion. She’d tried so hard- “If that was your business, I’d tell you.” 

The girl managed to sit up properly this time. She looked inordinately pleased with herself for that, like it had been a monumental task. “Well, hello then!” She offered a hand, the skin covering her slipping from her breast. Carmilla’s cheeks burned with the memory of a blush. “I’m Laura!”

Carmilla stared at the top of Laura’s head, her hair parted in swirling tufts and a strong cowlick. Her shoulders were smooth and pale beneath the curling ends of her hair. She was-

Too much for Carmilla to deal with right now. “Goodbye, Laura,” Carmilla said, somewhat frostily, and turned on her heel. The dock creaked ominously beneath her heavy footsteps, but didn’t dump her in the sea. A small kindness. Or cruelty. Carmilla wished she’d had the time to decide. 

“Hey!” Laura said indignantly, but Carmilla kept walking. It was clearly time to lose herself in something other than the sea. A pub would do, if it was still open at this hour. 

* * *

 

_Seven tears in-_

 

* * *

 

The next time was seven years later to the day, though Carmilla wouldn’t know that until she calculated it later. It was another year, another pier, another stinking human place. She didn’t want to drown herself, not now, but she needed the time by the sea. It didn’t change. Just like Carmilla. An anchor. As much as something so wild could be an anchor. 

At least the men were absent during the night. Though there had been technological advancements in Carmilla’s time, none had seemed to be enough to have many men about at night. When the moon was empty as it was now, the cobbled streets were darker than even the country had been. Inconvenient when Carmilla was hungry, but convenient when she wanted some peace. 

The slap startled her more the second time, for the incongruity of it. 

Carmilla spun, catching Laura in the last stage of her transformation. The sealskin didn’t peel, nothing so gauche. It simply shimmered and fell away, revealing Laura’s lithe human body beneath it. 

Carmilla’s fangs clicked down, locking over her human incisors. Laura stared at her, eyes a familiar brown. “Oh.”

There was a moment of tense silence. From the street by the pier, someone shrieked. Carmilla didn’t flinch. Laura did, her tail-legs smacking against the deck. 

“You look… the same,” Laura said, cautious. This time, she wrapped her coat tight around her as she rose from her puddle of sea. “Seven years I spent in my sea and you look the same.”

Carmilla tasted salt and blood, her fangs razor sharp against her lower lip. Oh, what she’d give for a night of peace. “Same for you, buttercup. I don’t suppose you have an explanation that goes beyond excuses?”

Laura snarled right back. Her teeth were blunt and human, but the way her face twisted was anything but. It was the way an animal snarled. Laura knew she had the strength to back up her same threat. “If you even _try_  to steal my coat-”

That was when Carmilla remembered the rest of the selkie mythos. They were brides of the sea, tied to the shore by their coats. Tied by men. 

Carmila’s fangs clicked back up to wherever they went and she stepped back, her hands out and empty at her sides. The sounds of the sea rushed back up around them, rushing and hushing and hiding all manner of city sounds. 

They regarded each other for a moment. The moon was empty and dark but Carmilla could see Laura easily, her slick hair and the curves of her body under her sealskin cloak. Laura had wide eyes, the kind that could see in the dark. 

Carmilla wondered what she saw of Carmilla. 

“I’ll leave you to your explorations,” Carmilla said finally. She stepped off the pier, careful not to appear threatening. Carmilla would do many things, but stealing a _person_  was beyond even her. She’d been stolen by Maman. That was enough to teach anyone a lesson. “I’d stay on top of the stones in the street, though. These people throw filth from their windows.”

Laura tilted her head as she stepped forward, eyes unending dark pools. Her feet splashed in the water swept up on the wood planks. “That’s good to know.”

Hunger yawned in Carmilla. Not bloodhunger. Something else. A hunger she hadn’t felt since Ell. It was sweetness and heat and ravenousness all in one. Carmilla hadn’t noticed it was missing until it had appeared again, nipping at her heels. 

Carmilla reached across the darkness to Laura, her palm facing up towards the shining stars. “I can show you around. If you like”

The smile started slow and ended sweet, tiny crinkles forming around Laura’s eyes. She splashed forward, her fingers tucking the skin into place with the ease of long practice. Laura took Carmilla’s hand, still damp from the sea. It was as cold as Carmilla’s was. “I’d like that.”

* * *

 

_Seven tears in the sea-_

 

* * *

 

Selkies had different constellations than humans, Carmilla learned that night. They tracked by the stars, swam their summers and winters by the guidance of their light. Stars were stories, ones to teach and ones to learn. 

She learned all Laura had to teach and ached for more.

 

* * *

 

_Seven tears in the sea for-_

 

* * *

 

Seven years after that, Laura found Carmilla on a beach in Norway, the sand frozen in wave-tossed curls. They carved their names in a dozen languages each, and Carmilla learned how to notch _Laura_  into seaweed. 

 

* * *

 

_Seven tears in the sea for my-_

 

* * *

 

When Laura shed her skin next to Carmilla for the fifth time, Carmilla knelt over her. 

“Can I brush out your hair?”

Laura was quiet through the process, quiet and trusting and pressing against Carmilla’s touch. Carmilla twisted Laura’s hair into a glossy crown of braids. 

When Carmilla finished and made to move away, Laura caught her hands. 

“Can I kiss you?”

 

* * *

 

_Seven tears in the sea for my love-_

 

* * *

 

Laura kissed like she wanted to still taste Carmilla when she returned to the sea. Carmilla kissed Laura like she didn’t notice the tang of fish and blood and time on Laura’s lips. 

 

* * *

 

_Seven tears in the sea for my love to-_

 

* * *

 

“Seven years gone?” Carmilla played with Laura’s hair, still damp from the sea. “You couldn’t stay longer before then?”

Laura traced the line of Carmilla’s smile, then the line of something else. By the time Carmilla remembered her question, Laura had slipped away.

 

* * *

 

 _-come_ _home._

 

* * *

 

If Carmilla forgot herself enough to breathe, the coffin sounded like the sea. Maman’s voice rasped in her ears, magic or just fear.  _You abandoned me for a slip of a girl! There are always other fish in the sea, Mircalla darling. I’ll give you some time to mull that over._

Carmilla stopped breathing. If she could just stop thinking-

 

* * *

 

_Come home to me._

 

* * *

 

Carmilla had long since lost track of time in the coffin, but the humans of this age were so delightfully good at keeping track of time. She remembered the day. She remembered the time. She remembered the places. She remembered everything but the sound of laughter, the way a smiling kiss felt against her lips.

Laura had kept her sane. Being alone had been tolerable when she knew it wasn’t forever. Laura, who was immortal or close enough. Laura, who had soft hands and wet hair and wit quick as a whip.

Laura, who wasn’t anywhere to be found. 

Carmilla dug into books. Anything she could find that vaguely referenced selkies, she read. She spent a small fortune on the books, and barely learned anything. Books built up in her small cottage, bricking up the windows. What Laura had told her took precedence, and that cancelled out most of the things the books tried to tell her. 

Which meant she had nothing. Nothing, or close enough. 

 _Cry seven tears into the sea_ , one book had told her. Carmilla doubted anyone could count seven tears and drop them into the ocean. Would her tears even count? Did it matter she was already dead and nearly gone? Was her grief cancelled by her unbeating heart?

Carmilla stumbled into the sea, wading and wading until the calm waters reached her fingertips. Whatever refuge the sea had once offered… it lingered. Faint and faraway. 

Alone in an ocean of pain, Carmilla cried. Not for any purpose. Just because it wasn’t like she’d be able to stop crying, anyway. In the ocean, she could slip under and pretend the salt was simply something from the waves. 

The water surged, soaking the ends of Carmilla’s sleeves. Carmilla slapped the water. 

And oh, that made it worse. Even here, Carmilla could swear she could hear the sounds of Laura hauling herself into human form. 

“I looked everywhere!” 

Carmilla fell. Water closed over her head, air bubbling from her breathless lips. Then she was ripped toward the air, familiar hands around her wrists. Laura babbled at her before Carmilla had cleared the water from her ears and eyes. “I’d only got a day on the shore and then I- it was so long! You were gone so long!” She never ran out of air, Carmilla’s seal girl. “I always saw you, no matter when I came up for air. For so many years! And then you were gone.”

Blind, Carmilla wrapped her arms around Laura. The water curled around them, half an embrace. Laura kissed her ear and talked on, her breath rustling Carmilla’s hair as Carmilla played with the ends of Laura’s, unwilling to let go. “Twenty-one years. That’s how long I waited! Because you should have come. But then I-”

“Shh,” Carmilla crooned. The tears had been choked away with Laura in her arms, her chest rising and falling with frantic breaths she didn’t need. “Oh, Laura.”

“I’ve always been told you can’t have both,” Laura whispered. Her arms tightened around Carmilla, soaked steel. “After a few years, I chose the sea again. It was too hard up here in the air. And I knew I couldn’t come back and was giving you up. Unless-”

“Seven tears.” The most awful kind of true love a story had ever held. 

Laura pulled back, her fingers twined tight in Carmilla’s clothes. Her sealskin was slipping as it always did. She felt like seaglass and sunshine. “I’m sorry you were crying.”

“Lucky,” Carmilla whispered. Her tears still fell, but Laura caught them, sweet kisses to her cheeks and fluttering eyes. No more tears into the sea. “We’re so lucky.”

Laura kissed her. Carmilla clung to her, the opposite of drowning. 

 

* * *

 

_Seven tears in the sea for my love to come home, to come home to me._

**Author's Note:**

> melimegreenleaf on tumblr prompted me! I meant to write three paragraphs but I wrote... this. Whoops. Good whoops!
> 
> As far as I know, that repeated line doesn't come from anywhere except my brain, though the general concept behind it is from general selkie mythology.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Seven Tears Into the Sea](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13675188) by [ThatAloneOne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatAloneOne/pseuds/ThatAloneOne)




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